


cruel professor, studying romances

by WatermelonDip



Category: Archie Comics, Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Archie Andrews Being an Idiot, Archie is the musician, Betty Cooper Deserves Better, Betty Has Bangs, Cute, F/M, Musicians, Pre-Canon, Writer Jughead Jones, don't come at me, i think, it's Archie, let's go unpopular ship, maybe she grew them out idk, not super important tho, so I shall give her this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-24
Updated: 2021-02-24
Packaged: 2021-03-12 18:35:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,888
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29513991
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WatermelonDip/pseuds/WatermelonDip
Summary: He plays, she listens, and they are silent in the orange sun.
Relationships: Archie Andrews & Betty Cooper, Archie Andrews & Jughead Jones, Archie Andrews/Betty Cooper, Betty Cooper & Jughead Jones
Kudos: 11





	cruel professor, studying romances

**Author's Note:**

> The new season of Riverdale is admittedly odd, but as I start this the new episode is coming out tonight, and since the last one didn't give much prompt to what is going to happen with the character's relationships after the time skip, I was inspired. This takes place before the show, of course, and I thought it would be nice to write since I'm an Archie Comic fan myself, and that Betty-Archie innocence was sort of lost in season one.

The strums are slow.

Betty is fifteen.

Archie is fifteen too, but he takes the situation differently.

Sometimes, when it is very early in the morning, he will pull back his curtain and wonder why she doesn't frown as much as she should. He looks at her like he knows why she looks back, but she doesn't, neither of them does, and everything is like flower petals. It's very soft, the way their words flow because innocence invades their very person when both are around each other.

Archie is learning, of course, and Betty is helping.

"Well, maybe your dad can find a discount. That's a thing, right?"

He sighs.

"Maybe, but we aren't the sort of people who get discounts that easily, ya know?"

She shrugs, thinks about the simplicity of his statement, and bites her lip. It's been a while since Betty avoided his glance. She usually looks back, smiles, and tells him she'll find a way(she always does). But now Betty seems to realize that there isn't really away, and she recalls Archie telling her that he wasn't very keen on confessing to his father that music was a certain passion of his, so she just stills.

His fingers move with little precision, but it's nice.

"I'll help," she blurts out, it could be mistaken, but it makes him perk up. She's fiddling with her hands. "I mean sure, I don't really know anything about music, or guitar-" she pauses, looks at her hands, keeps fiddling. "But I want to help, and I want you to be good, I do." She gulps, doesn't really understand why she's nervous, and he just looks at her like she's about to something else. She does, though, and it's confident. She brushes the blonde hair to the side of her forehead. "I want to help you, Arch."

He believes her, so he smiles back.

* * *

Suddenly, it's May.

They walk quietly, close, and the sun is very happy.

Betty has spoken to Archie many times about how she prefers to eat outside when the weather is good, and how the cafeteria can get much too crowded for her liking. He agrees, of course, and he tells her that he would even sit outside with her in the cold if she wished it. She never did, never does, but the thought makes her giddy. When it comes to romance Betty is somewhat inexperienced, and though she held hands with a brown-haired boy named Adam when she was fourteen, she can't flirt with red.

It's Mac n' Cheese today, not that either like Mac n' Cheese, but Jughead seems happy.

"Food, it's art, I mean it's disgusting here, but art nonetheless."

Archie laughs and Betty grins. They both think about how their friend is just as innocent as themselves. He always has been.

"You heard what Cheryl said, didn't you," the boy with the black hair asks. Betty can't flirt with him either, not like one would expect her to, so she shakes her head.

"No, but I think you're about to tell me."

"She's going on a date with a senior, which I personally find very," he trails off, tilts his head. "Disturbing." He shrugs now.

Archie bumps Jughead's shoulder, it's playful, Betty keeps walking close. They all eat, class begins once again, and then there is silence. Betty likes the silence, it helps her think about that boy she likes to imagine in a tux, but then the bell rings and she has to shuffle through the halls like she tends to do every day. There are days when she wants to be pretty, even though she knows she already very much is, but she wants to be Cheryl Blossom pretty.

She wants people to talk about it.

She wants one person, in particular, to talk about it.

Jughead eats the Mac n' Cheese really fast.

* * *

Not so suddenly, it's June.

Archie thinks about the end of Freshman year, how it went by very slow, and he looks down at his guitar.

She talks about cupcakes and making them together.

He talks about writing and not really wanting anyone to come over to his place tonight.

Archie thinks about the end of Freshman year, how it was flower petals in the wind, and he smiles at the girl he likes to imagine in a dress.

* * *

It's a week before summer, and Betty hugs him.

He hugs her back, of course, because he's not rude like his parents always told him not to be. He's the boy next door, and she's the girl in the same position, so they hug and they smile like that doesn't bother them at all. Sometimes Betty tells him that she wishes they weren't in these arbitrary positions of high stature, and then he says "English, Betts," which simply envokes another smile.

It's a week before summer, and Archie hugs her.

* * *

When freshman year is over everyone holds hands.

Of course, by everyone, it's just three people and they've all held hands before. There was once in second grade when Betty was crossing the road, and Jughead had his hands stuffed in his pockets, and she told him she wasn't really sure about cars yet and his hands weren't stuffed in his pockets anymore. She found that nice, and Archie thought friendship was really important, but Betty really likes the concept of comfort from a friendly face.

Archie held her hand because Chuck bothered her this one time in seventh grade and the red-haired boy told her he had her back.

But as they all hold hands now it's not an 'I'm scared of cars' thing, or a 'leave her alone loser' thing. It's a symbolic thing, sort of, which they take lightly if anything.

Archie smiles because Betty is wearing a dress. It's pink and casual but she looks really nice in it.

He thinks she looks really nice in it.

* * *

The strums are slow, but the good kind of slow, the kind of slow that has a purpose.

Betty is fifteen.

Archie is fifteen too, and he takes the situation fairly the same as her.

It's very early in the morning, and when it was even earlier he had pulled back his curtains in order to see the girl next door. She was there, something he hadn't assumed, and she was reading. He had asked what book it was when she opened her window and she told him it was Jane Austen because the romance was vital to her, and the color of her room made it all more whimsical.

"So, still no discount with the 'personal guitar trainer guy'?"

"Nope, not even a bit."

Betty sighs.

Archie smiles.

It's not that the boy was in lack of resources, it really tried, kept trying for years maybe, he could be as good as Betty told him he could be. But she's so kind, so incredibly kind, and she told him that once he gets a car she'll help him fix it whenever he needs, and she'll bake him as many cookies as it takes until he's content with the life he has been given. Betty is the sun and Archie is the earth, which is a metaphor she came up with herself in a certain lackluster fashion and scribbled into her diary one night.

Betty lives, and Archie does the same, but as they try to live together the world slows around them.

"I'm still gonna help you, Arch, lessons or not."

He believes her, always does, never falters.

When Betty smiles at Jughead, there is something that breaks, and it's not jealously because Archie couldn't ever even imagine what that would make him. It's just a feeling, maybe a loss of sorts, that makes him believe that maybe they have quite a nice future. They look nice, and everyone is still friends over the summer, but as the pool opens up and kids get in trouble for running too fast, black and blonde look better.  
  


Archie thinks that maybe he's crazy, and Betty bites her lip.

There is nothing but sun.

Jughead is the moon, and he is the opposite of Betty.

People may debate, but Archie is never very sure.

He is quick to hold her hand on the first day of Sophomore year. It's very rash, but her pale skin feels comforting in his. She bites her lip again, and his hair is parted against the way it would go naturally which gives it this unrealistic bounce that Betty comments on fondly. "Weird hair Arch," she says, "Weird, but, oddly, pretty cool." 

Everything is set in stone then because he can't love her too.

He realizes that the night after day one. She calls him, talks about how crazy to see how everyone had grown out their hair and learned about the existence of eyeliner. She told him how she missed him already, which was, given its simplicity, cute. But Archie did not flirt, just nodded, and let his eyes drift to the dark blue of his walls and the faint remembrance that came with such a color. He knew that in her words, though not very cryptic, was a song he would never find the notes in order to sing.

He could hear her smile and she couldn't hear his so easily.

Miles away, a girl who liked the color purple let her fingers brush over a countertop.

A smaller amount of miles away, a boy with a hat stretched his wrist.

"I've been looking online and I think I found this one guy who is giving lessons for not very much and-"

Archie found her face very pretty, he liked the color pink too, but darker colors suited him better.

"I mean, sure, it probably won't be as good as what you might want but so far your songs are going really great and I-"

He liked her sunny disposition, and he liked the way she was like this all the time, the fact that he knew, but the vast emptiness was tempting.

"I honestly just want you to be happy, Arch, I know you really want this to be a stable thing for yourself and-"

Archie loved her, at least he thought he did, but then a girl with black hair winked at him.

"I believe in you. I'll be here."

The girl with black hair didn't say things like that, she wasn't there, not some odd yet comforting constant. She was new, and she moved faster than Archie could even imagine catching up with. There was a draw, and his henleys were getting old. Her home was larger, larger than that window, larger than the all amount of space they both sat in when their talks got long and their smiles wide. Archie liked the unknown, now, seemingly more than he liked the color pink.

"I know, Betty, and I'll be here for you too, if you ever need anything."

Betty Cooper was the sun, and Archie Andrews was the earth.

She revolved around him, and he depended on her.

Though, it changed, because things always do, and they were two planets a few feet away. She stopped smiling at him like she used, though, he did the same.

Archie turned sixteen, later on, of course, and Betty was there.

His sneakers were getting too small.

**Author's Note:**

> Title Song: Campus, Vampire Weekend. 
> 
> No hate on Jughead, Bughead shippers, or anyone who subscribes to the delightful antics of Bonnie and Clyde over there, but it's been four seasons and I'm ready for some change.
> 
> Sorry about any typos.


End file.
